


Contagious

by LallybrochLoser



Category: Outlander (TV), Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: BECAUSE WE ALL NEED SOME FLUFFY FRASERS IN OUR LIVES OKAY, Don't @ Me, F/M, SUPER FLUFF TRAIN EXPRESSSSS, inspired by a gif I made, seriously this is some real tooth rotting floof, you might need to go see a dentist after this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 16:34:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30041562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LallybrochLoser/pseuds/LallybrochLoser
Summary: While an illness is slowly making it's way through Inverness, something else is spreading slowly through Claire as she works a long, grueling shift.
Relationships: Claire Beauchamp/Jamie Fraser
Comments: 25
Kudos: 169





	Contagious

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to the one shot that nobody asked for! And yet, here we are. See the GIF below. It's from SAS: Red Notice and it gives me SO much life. Unbeta'd, all mistakes are my own, I don't own any of the characters, I won't be adding to it, blah blah blah blah

It had been one case after another. Just in the first few hours of a grueling 24-hour shift I was coerced into taking in the emergency department, I had seen, treated and admitted some 6 of the 14 cases of an unknown stomach virus going around the city. They all presented with the same symptoms. High fever, nausea, with or without vomiting, and an intense thirst which no liquid on the planet could sate. Incidentally, even if they could satisfy their sudden water craving, none of them were able to hold it down. 

This mostly affected adults, though I did have to admit some children since they were most at risk of dying from the dehydration aspect of this illness. Still, that didn’t mean grown men and women weren’t capable of dying from it too. The ICU was going to have my head after today with all the business I sent their way.

I cursed myself for even picking up this shift, though I did it as a favor. I was a general surgeon, not an emergency room doctor. But Joe Abernathy, emergency physician extraordinaire and my best friend, had all but begged me to cover for one of his docs who had, ironically, caught the same mysterious stomach bug I was now doing battle with. In the end, I didn’t have the heart to refuse him. Much to Jamie’s chagrin.

_“Ye’ve always had a kind heart, Sassenach,”_ Jamie had told me as I was preparing to leave that morning, _“it’s what makes ye a great doctor. But ye dinna owe anyone any favors. Yer already workin’ yerself tae an early grave!”_

He wasn’t wrong. In the craziness of the last several months, I had seen more of the inside of Inverness' Raigmore Hospital than the home we shared. Or, so it seemed. It brought back memories of medical school when I had crammed so hard for my exams that I wound up in A&E with severe dehydration. Jamie didn’t leave my side for an instant. Benefits of running your own successful distillery, I surmised.

I rarely complained about the inconveniences of my job. The hours on end standing, walking, or running, the meal breaks that were somehow always cut two minutes too short, the bitter and oftentimes cold coffee in the breakroom (any breakroom), the list was never ending. Today, however, was not one of those days, as this mood of mine continued into the night. I usually did a fairly good job at keeping my irritations to myself, but I could tell it was starting to rub off of my colleagues. Most of them averted their eyes if they weren’t talking to me directly. I knew I had a glass face; Jamie always made sure to point it out whenever it was convenient, damn his eyes. But was I really that intimidating at work? I didn't think I was, but when did a villain accurately recognize themselves as such?

“Dr. Fraser?” a woman’s voice called out to me. I turned away from the chart in my hands of the patient I had just cleared to be discharged from the emergency department to face her. She was young with brown hair pulled back into a bun and a cherub face. She had to be one of the newest nursing recruits. Or emergency physician interns. There were twelve of each with me tonight and I couldn’t remember any of their names.

Fortunately though, all of them wore large print name tags. This girl’s read ‘Nancy McAlister.’ “Yes, Miss McAlister?”

“T-There’s a man, a p-patient, waiting fer ye in room three.” All the years I had lived in Scotland had given me the ability to tell which part of the Highlands someone was from based solely on their voice. I could tell this young woman was an islander. Whatever brought her to Inverness must have been special.

It hit me that she had just told me a patient was waiting for me. I furrowed my brows down at her, causing her to flinch slightly. “He’ll have to wait his turn, there’s three patients ahead of him and-”

“Pardon my interrupting, doctor,” Nancy said, maintaining what little composure and dignity she had. She was shaking at this point. “The gentleman insisted you were the only one who could help him.”

Before I could inquire further, she walked away. But not before I saw something in her hand. A strawberry scone. The very same strawberry scone that Jamie had made for breakfast that day. I knew there was only one left because Jamie wouldn't let me have it.

“Oh, that bloody man,” I swore under my breath as I secured the chart in my hand and huffed my way towards room three.

I didn’t bother knocking. Nor did I warn before coming in. I was too upset. But the angry started to drain away the instant I laid eyes on my husband.

James Fraser was not an insignificant man in any sense of the word. Towering well over six feet in height, with hair the color of fire and eyes matching the deepest part of the North Atlantic, it was very easy to pick him out of a crowd. I sometimes took that fact for granted, since he was always there. He was sitting on the bottom left side of gurney in the middle of the small examination room, one hand gripping the rail for support and the other flat across his chest, breathing hard and heavy.

“Sassenach,” Jamie breathed with difficulty, and my heart plummeted at the sight of my strong, Highland warrior, breathing through pursed lips. “Thank Christ yer here.”

“Jamie, what the hell?!” I reached him in two strides and slipped fingers on the lateral side of his wrist. His pulse was strong, but not quick. I felt his face and neck, and didn’t find any signs of fever. I put on my stethoscope to listen to his chest and back. His lungs were clear as a whistle, and he had a normal, steady heartbeat. By the time I was swinging the stethoscope back around my neck, Jamie was sitting up, no longer distressed, and giving me a sly look.

The gig was up. The method actor he was got me again. I wasn't angry anymore. I was downright furious.

“James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser, what in the hell do you think you’re doing?! I have patients to see! Actual, sick patients, mind you. I don’t have time for your silly games.” His gaze never wavered. In fact, his grin seemed to widen, which only irritated me further. “Where are the girls?”

“Murtagh has ‘em. Dinna fash. I’m no’ that incompetent o’ a faither.”

Our daughters, Faith and Brianna, were one of the biggest reasons why I became a doctor to begin with. They inspired me to do my very best every day.

Jamie sighed after a moment of me staring at him intently. “Joe called me.”

“He _what?_ ”

“Yer scarin’ the interns, Sassenach,” Jamie reasoned, and he got up off the bed to walk towards me. “Joe got a few calls from some o’ them crying their wee hearts out tae him. He didna think ye’d have yer mobile on ye, and he didna want tae ring yer work mobile. So he sent me here tae see what I could do.”

All the hot air deflated from me, and I deposited my exhausted self into a chair and my head into my hands. I was not known for being a hard person to work with. So if I was scaring people so much that Joe enlisted Jamie’s help-

“Oh God,” I moaned into my palms. “What have I done?”

“Yer tired, and stressed. Ye've done nothing wrong. Come tae me, _mo nighean donn._ Let me love ye a bit.”

I stood and Jamie took me into his arms. He was warm, and smelled of his usual male musk and pinewood soap. I brought my arms around him, my hands slipping under his clothes and onto his back. I felt the crisscross scars from neck to tailbone from an ATV accident years ago. The amount of surgeries and hospitalization he needed afterwards also inspired my journey through medicine. Neither of us spoke; he just gently swayed with me, from side to side. I could feel his heart thumping companionably beneath the soft cotton t-shirt against my cheek, and he breathed slowly with content. 

I could feel him smiling against my hair as we stood there in the middle of the exam room. Several minutes went by before I noticed that the sounds of his body were all I could hear. The chaotic noise of the emergency department had died away, leaving me feeling slightly less than corporeal. His body had always been the anchor I needed to re-ground myself to reality. 

His sense of calm and collective nature was just as catching as the damn illness going around tonight.

“Are ye alright, Sassenach?” He asked some immeasurable time later.

I took a deep breath to steady myself, and really feel it out. “Yes, much.”

“Good,” Jamie said with a smile, then he tilted my head up with one finger against the underside of my chin and kissed me. Like the rest of his body, his lips were soft and warm. I longed for this shift to end so I could reclaim them for myself without any time restraint.

“Ye’ve a glass face, _a nighean,_ but I canna tell what yer thinkin’ just now,” Jamie said, mildly puzzled.

“Well,” I said slowly, a mischievous grin spreading across my face. “I’m thinking Murtagh should probably keep the girls a bit longer.” I took a firm hold of his buttocks and pressed him closer to me. “I want to spend some quality time with you after work.”

Jamie’s eyes widened, and I saw his pupils dilate, even with the terrible lighting in the room.

“As ye say,” he replied dangerously.


End file.
